Just thought I’d let y’all know why I’m slightly out of touch this weekend. We drove down to Sarasota yesterday, and are driving back today.

We do this a lot these days. Last month we drove to Birmingham and back one Saturday. Family business.

This time we spent the night — at one of Leona Helmsley’s places. Oh, get this: Last night I had trouble logging on here at the hotel, and there was a number to call, and the tech who answered told me her name was … Leona.

Whoa.

Anyway, we had a nice dinner at this great Spanish-Cuban-themed restaurant, Columbia, that’s been here 100 years. Very nice. There were a bunch of kids there dressed up for their prom night. I found myself wondering whether any of them are from Robinson High School, which I attended the 10th and 11th grades (before going to Hawaii for my senior year, where I met Burl).

I was going to post a picture, but the hotel Wi-Fi can’t seem to handle that much data. And I didn’t want to bother Leona again. Oh, well. I’ll just tell you the water is absolutely beautiful, an aquamarine color thus far untainted by the oil spill several hundred miles away.

(OK, I finally got the picture to upload. It doesn’t really capture how beautiful it was there, though. Maybe I should have gotten out of the way.)